Friday, August 21, 2009

Sex is a bonding mechanism.

So, digging around the web, here are some interesting excerpts:

In addition, studies show that oxytocin in females, as well as the closely related vasopressin in males, is key to pair bonding.

"You first meet him and he’s passable," Witt said of the phenomena. "The second time you go out with him, he’s OK. The third time you go out with him, you have sex. And from that point on you can’t imagine what life would be like without him."

"What’s behind it?" she added. "It could be oxytocin."


In other words, human beings, and often even more reliably, women, are biologically and genetically designed to bond heavily with people that they have sex with- meaning that the "quickie" culture and its attendant pressures can be extraordinarily stressful and emotionally damaging.

Here's more, from the blog, The New View on Sex:

What about oxytocin?

Oxytocin is a hormone released in both men and women. Because a response is enhanced by estrogen, women tend to have stronger reactions to oxytocin, which is "thought to be released during hugging, touching and orgasm in both sexes. In the brain, oxytocin is involved in social recognition and bonding, and may be involved in the formation of trust between people and generosity."

So, how does it effect sexual relationships? There are a couple of ways oxytocin affects us in sexual relationships that have ended.

Dr. Eric Keroack said, "Emotional pain causes our bodies to produce an elevated level of endorphins which in turn lowers the level of oxytocin. Therefore, relationship failure leads to pain which leads to elevated endorphins which leads to lower oxytocin the result of which is a lower ability to bond. Many in this increased state of emotional pain and lower oxytocin seek sex as a substitute for love which inevitably leads to another failed relationship, and so, the cycle continues."

Based on the work of Dr. Keroack, we also have this explanation:

"An interesting finding in oxytocin research is the likelihood that oxytocin inhibits the development of tolerance in the brain’s opiate receptors. The excitement of sex is partly credited to endorphins exciting opiate receptors. As a human relationship matures, fewer endorphins are released. If sexual relationships are well bonded, though, the oxytocin response maintains the excitement despite how few endorphins are released. This keeps excitement present between oxytocin-bonded couples.

"In the same way, though, these studies reveal the rationale behind an inability of some to stay bonded in seemingly good relationships. People who have misused sex to become bonded with multiple persons will diminish their oxytocin bonding within their current relationship. In the absence of oxytocin, the person will find less or no excitement. The person will, then, feel the need to move on to what looks more exciting."

In Summary

Mary Beth Bonacci has a great summary of the normal effects of oxytocin and vasopressin: Oxytocin causes a woman to be forgetful, decreases her ability to think rationally -- and causes an incredibly strong emotional attachment to form with the man she is with. (Sense would argue that this hormonal response is more reliable initially in women than in men, given that they are biologically placed to carry children- which is why some men talk more frequently about their "crazy" clingy ex-girlfriends or one night stands- she bonded, they didn't with that particular person.)Men also produce some oxytocin during sexual intercourse. But their bodies also produce a hormone called vasopressin. Vasopressin, called "the monogamy molecule," kicks in after sexual activity, and its impact is to heighten a man’s sense of responsibility. It encourages that part of him which says, "My gosh, she may be carrying my child! I’d better get serious about life! I’ve got to get to work, to provide for this family!"
Posted by Emily at 10:29 AM

From a recent Time magazine article (July 02, 2009) on the state of the American marriage:

Few things hamper a child as much as not having a father at home. "As a feminist, I didn't want to believe it," says Maria Kefalas, a sociologist who studies marriage and family issues and co-authored a seminal book on low-income mothers called Promises I Can Keep: Why Poor Women Put Motherhood Before Marriage. "Women always tell me, 'I can be a mother and a father to a child,' but it's not true." Growing up without a father has a deep psychological effect on a child. "The mom may not need that man," Kefalas says, "but her children still do."

The above reminds me of the classic study that I read at university- a trend, which, to my knowledge, has never been reversed- girls who grow up in father absent homes reach puberty sooner. Their first menstrual cycle is on average, an entire YEAR earlier than girls who grow up in homes with fathers.

I couldn't read the entire article, as the links for it on Time's site were broken, so I found a summary of what other web sources had to say about their favourite points, and will reproduce those paraphrasings here:

o “ . . . We want something like that for ourselves; we recognize that it is something of great worth, but we are increasingly less willing to put in the hard work and personal sacrifice to get there. . . A lasting marriage is the reward, usually, of hard work and self-sacrifice.”

o "The fundamental question we must ask ourselves at the beginning of the century is this: What is the purpose of marriage? Is it . . . simply an institution that has the capacity to increase the pleasure of the adults who enter into it? Or is marriage an institution that still hews to its old intention and function — to raise the next generation, to protect and teach it, to instill in it the habits of conduct and character that will ensure the generation's own safe passage into adulthood?”

Finally, contained within the article was this magnificent quote:

"We need fathers to step up, to realize that their job does not end at conception; that what makes you a man is not the ability to have a child but the courage to raise one." -Barack Obama

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